


A Father's Lament

by orelseatlastsheunderstoodit



Series: Reflections and Deflections [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-25
Updated: 2018-08-25
Packaged: 2019-07-02 12:52:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15796914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orelseatlastsheunderstoodit/pseuds/orelseatlastsheunderstoodit
Summary: A Jedi Master separated from his padawan during the invasion of the Jedi Temple awaits his doom and remembers the past.





	A Father's Lament

**Author's Note:**

> In 2005, in the wake of Episode III, and the idea that there would be no more new Star Wars, I wrote a lot of fic, posted under the name of Laine_Snowtrekker over on TFN. This is one of those stories; this one has been lightly edited in order to include make references to canon material canon compliant (aka, the existence of Ahsoka!)

_"I want you to live! Now, go!"_

With those parting words, he'd shoved his apprentice down an empty corridor and had locked the door behind him.

He'd been alone ever since.

He knew that it had been the right thing to do, to give the boy more time--to give him a better chance at escaping. But with the tactics he did know, he had realized that the troopers had probably sealed off all exits and started a methodic search through the Temple. However, it was still a chance--and that was worth it.

The Force yelled out a warning and he sidestepped a clone's bolt, twirling and deflecting it. The trooper fell to the floor, his comlink falling off and rolling out of sight.

The Jedi turned down another corridor and stopped in a small alcove to gather his wits--and a breath or two. He wasn't as young as he used to be.

_Meditate._

"What?" he said aloud.

_Meditate. Now._

Seeing as the Force was so insistent, the Jedi dropped to his knees. Closing his eyes, he drew the Force to himself. The Force was in agony tonight, filled with pain, death, and destruction--but there was still a part that flowed safe and smooth, a part that soothed him. And that part of the Force brought unbidden memories to his mind.

> _He had just returned from his first Padawan-less mission. It had been a difficult mission, one to an Outer Rim planet that had soured but had eventually turned out well. The debriefing had been long and tedious, and he was now off to see his recently Knighted padawan._
> 
> _The Master walked along one of the Temple corridors, lost in thoughts about the last mission and about how much he had missed teaching someone--even if Sahira had only been Knighted six months ago. He turned a corner and smacked into someone._
> 
> _Both of them went sprawling, and and the master landed with an oomph, while hearing the skittering of flimsies and textbooks. He looked up to see a boy also sprawled across the tiles and he had inadvertently started laughing. It reminded him of himself when he had been a Padawan, always dawdling and then rushing because he'd timed it wrong. It seemed that children hadn't changed much. He stood and helped the boy to his feet._
> 
> _"Late to class, right?" he asked._
> 
> _The boy's ears began to turn red. "Yes, sir," he said quietly._
> 
> _Something nagged him in the back of his mind--he could swear that it felt like the first time he'd taken a learner, when he'd chosen Sahira. "I'm Master Gerik Nimai," he said._
> 
> _"Sorry for running into you, Master Nimai," the boy said. "I wasn't watching where I was headed."_
> 
> _"That's quite all right," Gerik replied. "I should have known that you were right around the corner, with your mind in the clouds."_ _As were mine._
> 
> _The boy blushed even more. "I am always being told I need to be in the present more, sir," he said. "I'm working on it."_
> 
> _"Oh, that's not what I meant. What's your name, Initiate?"_
> 
> _"Li Acalan."_
> 
> _"How old are you?"_ _Oh, please be the right age. Please be the right age._
> 
> _“Tomorrow’s my thirteenth Naming Day," Li said, his head tilting downward so that his eyes could watch the tiles._
> 
> _Perfect._ _"I was on my way to the creche," Gerik said. "Would you like to join me?"_
> 
> _Li stooped and began to gather his scattered things. "But I'm late to class," he said._
> 
> _Gerik reached out, put a hand on the boy's shoulder, and pulled him to his feet. Their eyes met, and he noticed that Li's were an intense green._
> 
> _"I think that lesson can wait for today," he said._

He smiled, remembering how he had asked Li to be his padawan the next day--and he was happy to be a learner's teacher again. Li was everything that Sahira hadn't been--in fact, they were almost exact opposites, personality-wise. Li was a quiet young man, witty, knowledgable, and dedicated to the service of the Force. Days turned into weeks, and weeks into months--and soon, it had come to today, almost three years later. In two days it would be their choosing anniversary, and he had made a gift for Li--a compilation of trivia and important facts from all of the planets that they had visited in the last few years.

Gerik realized now that 'in two days' would most likely never take place, but he still hoped that Li would survive. Maybe another Master or another Knight would survive, and take his boy under their wing and train him to be a full Knight. He sighed deeply, already missing having Li beside him. The youth was such a strong presence in the Force that it felt empty without his Padawan by his side.

> _"I have a bad feeling about this," Li whispered._
> 
> _"So do I," Gerik replied._
> 
> _"Then why are we going?"_
> 
> _Gerik chuckled. "It's our duty, Li. We're to draw out the Senator's assassin, detain them, and deliver them to the Courts." He looked at the almost-fifteen-year-old in front of him--sometimes he worried that the boy was a little_ _too_ _intense--but then again, this was the life of a Jedi. Most Jedi were intense like that. "And remember to keep in character."_
> 
> _Li nodded in response._
> 
> _The pair swaggered out of their docking bay and into the nearest cantina. They found a booth and Li sprawled across the replihide cushions. "Can I getta drink?" he asked in a bored tone._
> 
> _"No, you may not," he said. "We're here to meet with our contact, and have a 'chat' with him."_
> 
> _"Dad," Li whined. "Why not?"_
> 
> _"I said so. You're not here to drink."_
> 
> _"Yeah, I heard ya. What do I care if you wanna talk to the contact who set up the assassination?"_
> 
> _"Hush, boy. I'm going to get a drink."_
> 
> _"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Li said with a lazy wave of a hand. He unholstered one of his blasters and began playing with it. "Take whatever time ya need."_
> 
> _Gerik had only gotten ten steps closer to the bar when Li's voice rang out:_
> 
> _"Father! Behind you!"_
> 
> _He had whirled in time to see the assassin crumple to the ground , her blaster stretched out towards him. Behind her body, still standing at the booth, was the shocked-looking Li, who was holding his blaster out. The tip of it was still smoking. "I didn't mean to," he whispered as Gerik checked the assassin's pulse. There was none. He stood and looked at the boy--it hurt him to keep in character._
> 
> _"Of course you did, son. Good job," he said. "Now that the 'chat's' over, we can leave."_ _Yes. We can leave this Force-forsaken bar, this Force-forsaken planet. My boy shouldn't have had to kill someone._
> 
> _He and Li went back to their ship to file a report and set a course for home._
> 
> _And then he had let the teen cry onto his shoulder over the first death that he'd been directly responsible for._

_What of the Sith today? Who was he before now?_ Gerik thought. _Will he ever feel any sorrow for the deaths he's caused today?_

The Force pulled him away from that thought and into another.

> _He had sent his Padawan to practice with Knight Skywalker--Li had seemed excited to have one of the best sabremen in the Order want to spar with him. Though Gerik knew that Li was excellent himself, he still made the teen practice--that weapon was his life. He had just settled down on the couch with a hot cup of java and the Coruscant Times after taking a long shower when the door chime rang._
> 
> _Gerik sighed, set down his cup and paper, then went and answered the door._
> 
> _"Master Kenobi," he said. "I didn't expect you. I thought you were planning to sleep."_
> 
> _"So I was. May I come in?" he asked._
> 
> _"Of course," Gerik said. He opened the door wider. "Come in and take a seat."_
> 
> _Kenobi had entered, looking tired and worried. The two had talked in the past thirteen years, Gerik to mainly give training advice and Kenobi to have a break from being the 'Sith-killer', or, more recently, 'The Negotiator'._
> 
> _"Perhaps I was wrong when I told Anakin that he was the one that was apt to keep going despite exhaustion," Gerik said._
> 
> _Kenobi laughed tiredly. "I think he got that from me," he said. He took a seat on the couch._
> 
> _"Is there any particular reason why you chose to visit me?"_
> 
> _"Well, Padawan Acalan is your second Padawan, correct?"_
> 
> _Gerik nodded. "Yes, Li is my second."_
> 
> _"What's it like to train another student? Is it anything like training the first?"_
> 
> _"Are you thinking of taking another learner?"_
> 
> _Kenobi nodded. "If and when this war ends. I might take time for some solo missions, but...yes, I do."_
> 
> _"As to your question, it is nothing like training the first. If anything, you'll be better at it. Plus, I'm sure that taking a Temple-raised initiate as Padawan will be easier than training Anakin."_
> 
> _Kenobi nodded silently, then said, "I'm not sure that Anakin would like it. I think that maybe he'd feel rejected."_
> 
> _"Not when he’s training his own apprentice," Gerik said, then smiled at the man almost ten years his junior. "Scary to think of the one you trained training another, isn't it?"_
> 
> _Kenobi smiled. "Especially whenever I remember that Anakin’s someone's Master. All of that comes back on me.”_
> 
> _“Well, with that logic, it all comes back to Master Yoda,” Gerik said._
> 
> _Both men laughed. "I do worry about Anakin, though,” Kenobi said. “If he's up to all the pressure that he's been under.”_
> 
> _"Master Kenobi, your son is now a Knight. Hopefully that means that he can handle it," Gerik said._
> 
> _"Call me Obi-Wan, Master Nimai," Kenobi said. "What do you mean, my son?"_
> 
> _"Anakin doesn't feel like a son to you?"_
> 
> _Kenobi shrugged. "He does, but I don't want to be attached to him."_
> 
> _"Ah, the no-attachments rule." Gerik also shrugged. "We're humans. We can't help but become attached to those we love. I love Sahira as if she were my daughter. Li as if he were my son."_
> 
> _"I loved my master," Kenobi said. "And I almost went to the Dark Side because of it."_
> 
> _"But you didn't."_
> 
> _"No," he replied. "Because I loved my master. I didn't want him to feel me fall--so I fought the Darkness back."_
> 
> _"Can Anakin fight the darkness back?"_
> 
> _"I think so."_
> 
> _"This is the way I think it goes," Gerik said. "The Force chooses our children for us--we raise them as best we can, then we set them free to make their own decisions. It's all that we can do--to be the best fathers, to be the best masters that we can be. What they choose to do after they leave our tutelage is up to them."_
> 
> _"But--what if they choose the wrong thing? Doesn't it mean that we have gone wrong in our training somehow?"_
> 
> _"Perhaps. Perhaps not. But our children have free will--they have the choice, as you did. As we do."_
> 
> _Kenobi nodded. "Son, perhaps. But now Anakin's my brother, Master Nimai."_
> 
> _"And Sahira my sister--that's why we can't be their fathers anymore. Just their friends."_
> 
> _Kenobi stood. "We head back out to the Outer Rim tomorrow, Anakin, Ahsoka, and I."_
> 
> _"May the Force be with you, then," Gerik said, standing and walking with Kenobi to the door. "I hope that I have helped you."_
> 
> _"Oh, you have," Kenobi said. "Thank you."_
> 
> _"You're welcome."_
> 
> _The two bowed, and Gerik went back to his java and newspaper._

"So, what do we have here?" a sarcastic voice said.

Gerik opened his eyes to see a hooded man--the Sith, the traitor of the Jedi--standing in front of him. The Sith's lightsaber spilled blue light into the alcove. "Knight Skywalker?" he asked.

"I am Vader," the Sith said. "'Skywalker' means nothing to me."

Gerik rose to his feet. "Anakin," he said. "What are you doing?"

"Bringing peace to the galaxy," Vader responded. "Where's your apprentice?"

"Far from here, I hope."

"He won't get too far, I promise you that."

"Being a Sith won't bring you what you desire," Gerik said. "It'll only bring heartache, worry, and death."

"What do you know of heartache?" Vader asked. "What do you know of worry?"

_I know that I've been missing my apprentice for the last six hours. I know that I've worried about him constantly._

"I know enough to know that the Dark Side won't bring you anything but those things."

"Being a Jedi won't bring you what you want, either," Vader said. "So, defend yourself, Jedi."

Gerik ignited his lightsaber, its green blade shining vividly. "Gladly, for it gives Li more time to escape. He held you in high regard, you know."

Vader lunged, and the two men exchanged blows. Gerik quickly realized that the Dark Side had made Anakin--for he refused to call him by his Sith name--very powerful, almost too powerful.

 _Be safe, Li,_ Gerik thought. _Oh, be safe._

As Skywalker's blade slipped through his defenses, Gerik realized that democracy had been banished, that the Order would fall, and that Vader would probably find and kill Li--his apprentice, his son.

_Oh, Li, be safe. Oh, Obi-Wan, both of us have lost our sons today_


End file.
